Media management service Plex announced yesterday that its Plex Media Player app is now free to everyone. Previously, using Plex Media Player required a paid Plex Pass subscription, a $5 per month value.

In addition, Plex announced an extension for competitive player Kodi which lets users of Plex Media Server stream their media content to the Kodi app.

Plex Media Player

Plex Media Player is available for a bunch of desktop and mobile platforms, including streaming devices, gaming consoles and smart TVs. The app features an attractive user interface, detailed settings and a variety of capabilities.

It’s got built-in subtitles support and its extensible architecture allows for third-party plugins and more. Network playback from a server or network attached storage devices in Plex Media Player still requires a Plex Pass subscription.

Mainly focused on unleashing the home theater experience on TVs, Plex Media Player now includes a desktop mode suitable for enjoying your media in a desktop environment. The app harnesses the power of the Plex Web app to give you a beautiful home theater experience in a slick desktop media player.

Plex for Kodi add-on

The new Plex add-on for Kodi was created in partnership with some of the leading Kodi add-on developers. The add-on allows for a fully-immersive Plex experience within the competitive Kodi media player app.

Aside from other features, the add-on provides the same Plex server discovery, user switching, library browsing and media playback experience.

The add-on is Plex Pass only “for now,” said the company.

The Kodi add-on will be released publicly beyond just subscribers to the Plex Pass.

Plex Media Server acts as a media browser and is required to stream content to Kodi. Full functionality in Plex Media Server is limited to Plex Pass subscribers. Subscriptions are available at $4.99 per month or $39.99 per year. A Lifetime subscription is a one-time $149.99 payment.

Some of the premium features available to subscribers only include the ability to enjoy your media offline on iOS, Android and Windows devices, Plex Mix playlists, exclusive forum access, movie trailers, cast interviews, extras and other bonus features, the ability to sync photos from your mobile devices to Plex Media Server and sync your media to the cloud, as well as Gracenote song identification, album review and artist biographies.